An Institutional Conflict of Interest at the New York Federal Reserve

According to The New York Times, even after taxpayers rescued Citigroup, regulators at the New York Federal Reserve failed to monitor the company adequately. The regulators, although adequately staffed and proficient in training, failed to move swiftly as the bank’s financial condition deteriorated from as early as 2005, and were overly optimistic about the bank’s prospects as late as December, 2009. From 2006 to 2007, decisions on poorly underwritten loans were changed from “turned down” to “approved.” As many as 80 percent of the loans that Citigroup sold to Fannie Mae, Ginnie Mae and other investors were defective. “Although the dedicated supervisory team is well-qualified and generally has sound knowledge of the organization, there have been significant weaknesses in the execution of the supervisory program,” according to one excerpt of the 2009 review. Tim Geithner, who as president of the New York Fed from 2003 to 2008 was in charge of overseeing Citigroup, went on to become the US Secretary of the Treasury.

The full essay is at Institutional Conflicts of Interest, available at Amazon.

On the Arrogance of Power: Greenspan, Rubin, and Summers in the Clinton Administration

Over two years after the financial crisis of 2008, a commentator on Fox News said that the banks should not stop the foreclosure process because that would not be good for the free market. He said that people who cannot afford their houses should lose them. Another commentator remarked that there was still too much government in the financial sector. This, according to the commentator, is “the problem.” It is particularly striking that Alan Greenspan’s stark admission to a U.S. House committee in 2008 that the deregulated laissez faire market paradigm contains a fundamental flaw was lost on the two commentators. In May 2011, House Speaker Boehner charged that business is over-regulated. This comment too is remarkable given Greenspan’s realization. If a people disowns its own lessons, history is destined to repeat itself.

The full essay is at Essays on the Financial Crisis.